Patricia Levesque is the Executive Director of ExcelinEd in Action.
By Patricia Levesque, Executive Director of ExcelinEd in Action
This op-ed originally appeared in The Hamilton County Reporter
In what feels like the blink of an eye, the digital landscape has shifted from a tool for connection to a sophisticated environment designed to capture and monetize children’s attention.
This legislative session, Indiana lawmakers have crafted a bill that would protect minors from the many harms associated with social media, while also working to stop the addictive nature of these platforms.
It is the right thing to do – creating a defense mechanism against constant digital overreach that is distracting our kids from real life at best and endangering their mental health and physical safety in the worst situations.
Unfortunately, lawmakers recently removed these critical guardrails from the bill before it moved from the Indiana Senate to the Indiana House. We are calling on House lawmakers to restore these safeguards and ensure they become law this year.
Big tech companies have proven time and again they are not willing to protect kids, which means it’s time for states to step up and step in. This is not a theoretical argument. It’s supported by internal documentation from the platforms themselves.
Recent evidence, including disclosures from litigation against Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta, paints a disturbing picture of corporate negligence. Internal records suggest that platforms have operated under multi-strike policies for accounts linked to human trafficking and failed to wall-off users flagged for inappropriate interaction with children.
In 2023, New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez filed a lawsuit against Meta aimed at protecting children from sexual abuse, online solicitation, and human trafficking.
